Evanston Receives $580,000 Grant to Rehab the Ladd Arboretum Trail

The Ladd Arboretum Trail will be rehabilitated thanks to a $580,000 grant from the Illinois Transportation Enhancement Program.

The trail is among 54 projects funded by the federal program, which encourages transportation-related enhancement projects. The City of Evanston’s match for the rehabilitation project is $145,000, according to a press release. 

“The arboretum’s existing trails were constructed between 1960 and 1961 and since that time have received minimal capital investment. Presently the trails are in a deteriorated state and due to poor drainage conditions are often unusable in inclement weather,” Doug Gaynor, director of Parks, Recreation and Community Services for the City of Evanston, said in a statement. “This issue is of particular concern, as some children walking to and from Haven and Kingsley Schools use the trail and are unable to stay on the path during poor weather due to the existing trail’s poor condition. Trail reconstruction will help mitigate this issue and provide students, along with other non-motorized travelers, with a new and modern multiuse trail.” 

In 2007 the city adopted The Ladd Arboretum Master Plan, which includes reconstruction of trails throughout the arboretum, which is also an important bike path in the city’s bike plan and provides key connections to and through neighborhoods.

The Ladd Arboretum, a 17-acre parcel of land along the North Shore Channel that the city leases from the Metropolitan Water Reclamation District of Greater Chicago was first proposed in the 1950s, according to Gaynor.